Apparatuses are known which are suitable to package products of various types and sizes by automated insertion of such products in boxes which are shaped substantially like a parallelepiped and are made for example of cardboard or other similar materials. The boxes are usually of the type which is fed in a substantially flattened configuration providing minimum space occupation, i.e., folded along the longitudinal edges.
Some of the known types of apparatus provide sequentially certain fundamental production steps; in particular, they first pick each box from an appropriately provided magazine, then open the boxes to make them assume a parallelepipedal configuration, and finally deposit them, substantially by gravity, on a sort of horizontal conveyor of the belt or chain type or the like, which then transfers them in an orderly fashion toward successive production stations, including mainly the station for filling with the products to be packaged (for example large and small bottles, tubes, blister packages and others). An apparatus of this kind is described in Invention U.S. Pat. No. 1,298,367 in the name of this same Applicant.
These apparatuses are provided usually with a horizontal conveyor, which moves in a closed circuit along a substantially annular path, for example with at least two straight portions connected by curved portions. The continuous motion of the conveyor, provided with the boxes to be filled, along the path described above therefore entails the onset of accelerations and dynamic actions which limit excessively the production rate of the apparatus in relation to the actual requirements of the market.